Company Files Patent Infringement Lawsuit Against Zynga

With the US Justice Department aggressively seizing domain addresses of companies alleged to be involved in patent infringement, Zynga better be careful.

While we are being a little tongue-in-cheek, the world’s largest free Internet poker game is accused of violating two patents owned by Agincourt Gaming. 

That company is seeking unspecified monetary damages and a permanent injunction against Zynga according to the Wednesday filing presented in the U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware. 

Agincourt, which focuses on the social-gaming space, said it "owns foundational patents that claim priority back to 1996 and cover the processes for credits-based online gaming and a prize redemption system based on the outcome of game play."

Patent lawsuits are nothing new to the world of online poker.   In 2007, Bodog.com lost its domain name over a period of several months , the result of a patent dispute involving  a "method and system for interactively transmitting multimedia information over a network which requires a reduced bandwidth”.

- Aaron Goldstein, Gambling911.com